


Fifty Shades of Beige

by Vituperative_cupcakes



Category: The Mighty Boosh (TV)
Genre: BDSM, Boot Worship, Fetish Clothing, Fluff, Frottage, Human Furniture, Humor, Love Confessions, M/M, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Shibari, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-08
Updated: 2016-06-01
Packaged: 2018-06-01 01:22:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 17,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6495274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vituperative_cupcakes/pseuds/Vituperative_cupcakes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Howard embarks on a journey into the realm of the sensual. Vince decides to lead the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Knotty Problem

_Once you’re lost_  
_In twilight’s blue_  
_You don’t find your way  
_ _The way finds you_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Someone’s in the Wolf”

As long as he could remember, Howard Moon had never really been able to ask for what he wanted.

It stemmed from a vague feeling that the universe was continually punishing him for something he didn’t understand, not from any one single source. Which just made it all the harder to fight against.

Love, shelter, mercy, all things that should have been free were priced steeply against him. Gradually it had worn him down to the point where he just stopped asking for things and coveting them instead. Why risk a girl throwing her hot tea in your face when you could slink behind her in the shadows and masturbate ashamedly about it later? He felt by circumventing rejection, he could somehow avoid the pain that came with it. When he realized it wouldn’t work quite like that, he started inflicting his own pain as well.

Like so many things, it started in adolescence. They’d read about the flagellants in the years of the black plague, those who walked around hurting themselves to show god that they really didn’t need to get the plague, they were already punishing themselves, see?

Howard, at home on his bed with the book open to a lurid woodcut of hooded figures with whips and flails, rolled up his sleeve. He hated blood, and burning was right out. Experimentally, he took a chunk of his flesh and pinched. Not quite. He gave it a little twist. Better.

Putting aside the book, Howard gripped his forearm in earnestness. He had never done a chinese burn one-handed before. It took a few fumblings before he realized that if he tightened the strap on his watch, he could manage well enough. With the pain came a feeling of exhilaration. Finally, something was being inflicted on him that made sense.

If the universe lessened its grudge against Howard, he didn’t notice. It seemed inconsequential to the sorcery of manipulating his own flesh. Pain was relief, and, as these things go, after a time it became release.

Howard would bite his own lip when wanking, twist a strand of hair so hard his eyes watered. He started to crave humiliation in an unconscious way, it gave him an excuse to inflict pain on himself. And when he met Vince, well…

Well…

He could never tell Vince. He couldn’t ask for it and he couldn’t say what he wanted. Not ever. He’d die. Not the good kind of death, either, where they dedicate a statue to you and literary students analyze your suicide note for decades to come. No, this death would be a spiritual death, a demolition of his being so complete that physical death would seem like a redundancy afterwards.

Also, Vince would probably laugh, the little prick.

Only one person had ever come close to guessing Howard’s proclivities. Unfortunately that person was Dixon Bainbridge.

Howard knew from the little...frisson between Bob Fossil and Bainbridge that the explorer had some sadistic tendencies. And Howard could see from the smug, cool looks Bainbridge would occasionally shoot him that he could smell the same submissiveness on Howard that he could on Fossil.

Only, Howard was not so desperate. At least, he liked to think he wasn’t. But that didn’t stop the dreams he had occasionally, of Bainbridge painting him like a zebra and then hunting him naked through the zoo, of their mustache meshing masculinely as Bainbridge held a lead around Howard’s neck. God, they were as erotic as they were unappetizing.

Once the zoo closed, Howard learned to make do. He learned how to hurt himself in ways that didn’t draw suspicion, usually just standing near Vince got him hit in the face with something. Then Vince would laugh and Howard would twinge inside and that would be the end of it.

And that worked. For a while.

Howard got used to things. He got used to the universe punishing him, and he got used to being hit, kicked, and pelted with food items. He had to expand his vocabulary of pain, and so he turned to the internet.

And this was what started the whole mess.

He’d been looking up shibari(easily disguisable as a martial arts technique should he ever forget to delete the browsing history) and thought it looked good. And it was. For a while.

The knots pressed into him, the rough sisal he’d chosen rubbing his tender flesh with just enough friction that he got off without even touching himself.

But then he realized the folly in choosing a configuration that left his feet up near his head while his hands were behind his back. After ten minutes of squirming, he was contemplating knocking a lamp over and using the shards when the front door opened.

Vince had gone out for the night. Usually that meant he’d be gone for the better part of two days as he was passed around like a sweet among Camden’s trendy young set.

Howard froze. He had absolutely no words, no excuses as Vince abandoned a jacket that looked like dragonscale on the settee and wandered aimlessly through the room.

“Been at Swedish Fish, listening to Maria Jupiter’s new album,” he said in a bored tone, “after about an hour I was done with viking techno. Please tell me there’s some juice left, I’m dehydrated as a motherbitch.”

His footsteps faded into the kitchen. Howard sat like a neat present, flop-sweating.

Vince came back in the room, carton in-hand, mischievous twinkle in his eye.

“So what’s this, then?” he asked casually.

Howard cleared his throat. His paralyzed mind could not come up with any excuses, but that didn’t matter because Vince was swaggering closer, walking deliberately heel-to-toe in boots so shiny Howard could see his own desperate face in them. Vince stopped so that his toes were in line with Howard’s chin. Howard tried to quash images of those toes grinding into his flesh with delicious pressure, as his excitement had enjoyed a sudden, very visible replenishing.

“Vince,” Howard said in a defeated tone, “could you untie me?”

“Sure.” Vince sounded like he was stifling a giggle. Howard didn’t have the courage to look at his face. “Lick my boots.”

Howard swallowed. “...what?”

“You ‘eard me.”

Howard passed a few deep breaths in through his nose and out through his mouth. Vince began tapping the toe of one boot.

God, if Vince was joking, if he pulled away just before Howard’s tongue touched his shoe and laughed…

One of the toes pushed forward.

Howard’s mouth opened and his tongue slid quite naturally up the white leather of Vince’s boots. With every lick he could feel himself getting harder. God, so soon after a satisfying(for him, anyway) orgasm?

Vince had made no noise, no little nudge to let Howard know whether he was serious or not. Howard still didn’t dare look up. His tongue traveled up to the ankle of the boot and suddenly there was a hand twisting in his hair, just enough to hurt a little. Howard’s cock twinged. The hand urged him forward, so he licked past the ankle, to the calves of the boots. His body ached from holding the position so long, his cock ached from rubbing on the floor, his scalp ached from the hand pulling his hair. And he loved it.

One of the toes raised and found his chin. It tilted his head up until he was staring up at Vince, tongue out.

Vince was flushed and breathing slightly heavily, eyes twinkling and smiling wide. His hair fell past his face in dark strands. He relaxed his grip and petted Howard’s head. This small kindness made Howard arch and cry out as his semen painted the floor.

Howard’s face hit the floor just hard enough to sting. He panted, the floorboards cool against his forehead. His hands were suddenly released as the ends of the rope tickled his back. He let his arms flop beside him as Vince worked on his feet. Relaxed, he stretched out full-length on the floor, eyes closed, enjoying the solid surface. Howard was waiting for Vince to leave.

He didn’t.

Instead, Vince catwalked over to the armchair and sat cross legged.

“So how on earth did you get yourself into that mess?” he asked, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to find your flatmate tied up and naked.

Howard pressed his cheek to the floor. “It’s a long story.”

“What happened? Anger a fakir? Run afoul of an enchanted rope? Sexy burglars?”

“Just...trying something new.” He desperately wanted that to be the end of it, wanted this all to just go away.

But Vince leaned forward. “That’s awfully daring for a man who won’t join me for a night out because he’s afraid of missing an Ingmar Bergman marathon.”

Howard didn’t deny it.

“Well, this explains a lot of things. Quite a lot of things.” Vince shifted. “So..what do you think?”

“What do _I_ think?” The floorboards gave an odd resonance to Howard’s voice, like it was coming from somewhere outside of Howard’s body.

“About the future. About this.”

Howard’s heart leapt before he could stop it. Vince didn’t mean it like that. Nothing good ever happened to Howard TJ Moon. Nothing.

“The future?” He croaked.

“Well, it’s dangerous, innit? Suppose those ropes cut off circulation, or got around your neck, or…” Vince let the sentence dangle.

Howard looked up. He had pressed as much of his body as possibly against the floor, trying to hide his nudity. Vince looked like he could see through all layers of Howard, through his skin and the air of disdain he cultivated, right into his mind. It was terrifying.

“What do you suggest?” He asked wearily.

Vince steepled his fingers, grinning like a villain.

“I’m so glad you asked,” he said.


	2. The Contract

_We get some rules to follow  
_ _That and this,  
_ _These and those_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “No One Knows"

Howard wrinkled his forehead at the paper on the table in front of him. “...so, explain this to me again?”

They were in the dining room. Vince was in a kimono covered with halftone dots, hair fashionably bedraggled. He sipped a smoothie and grinned disarmingly.

“It’s bog standard,” he said, “I looked it up on the internet. It’s a contract. It lays out exactly what you’ll allow, and what you won’t”

“Aha. And what exactly is ‘figging’?”

Vince , still grinning, raised an eyebrow. Howard turned thoroughly red and laid the paper down.

“I see,” he said in a carefully neutral tone. “This doesn’t strike you as...embarrassingly formal?”

“Not at all. Tells me what you’re up for, and what you aren’t.”

“But what if I don’t know what I’m up for?”

“There’s a ‘negotiable’ column.”

Howard cleared his throat. He hadn’t been able to look Vince in the eye, even more so than normal. Vince, on the other hand, was grinning like a cat in an aviary.

“Look, if it’s daunting you, we can always go slow.”

Howard asked, “look, I may regret the answer, but I have to know: why are you being so supportive?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Vince’s tone was innocent, but his unfading grin belied that sentiment.

“Oh god, you’re going to take pictures and then plaster them all over the tubes, aren’t you?”

Vince had been taking a sip of smoothie, now he snorted and spilled a little.

“Crikey!” he coughed, “give me some credit, would you? That’s only funny when it’s not true.”

Howard rolled his eyes. “Let’s get back to it.”

“Whipping?”

“Yes on the practice. No to most of these,” Howard waved his hand at the list of materials.

“Oh come on, bamboo cane? It’s classic!”

“There’d be splinters, Vince, and that’s literally the last area I’d want to get one of those.”

Vince sank back with a cheeky grin. “All right. Rope play?”

Looking studiedly elsewhere, Howard checked it off.

“Knew it. Suspension?”

“You think there’s anywhere in here that could support my weight?”

“Who says it has to be here?”

“Vince, I’d like to straighten this out right now: I am never, not once, going to agree to taking this scene public.”

“Spoilsport.” Vince waved it away. “Knife play?”

“No.”

“Hot wax?”

“No.”

“Figging?”

Howard threw a pillow at Vince, who had dissolved into giggles. “Right. Let’s make a rule here and now: if I have to ask what it is, I probably don’t want to do it.”

“All right, all right.” Vince thought for a moment. “Humiliation?”

“I thought that was a given.”

“No,” said Vince in a surprisingly informative tone, “it doesn’t have to be about humiliation. There’s comfort, fear, loads of themes you can shoot for.”

Howard stared at him. “How do you you know so much about this?”

Vince gave him an elusive smile. “I’m a man of the world, Howard. That’s all you need know.”

“What world, the world of three weeks after graduation right before we took holiday? I’ve literally never been a year away from you, where are you getting all this?”

“One day I may answer you,” Vince said in mock-solemnity. “What’s left?”

Howard studied the list. “Erm, temperature, feminization...you know, why don’t I just finish out this list rather than say it all out loud.”

Vince shook his head fondly and finished his smoothie while Howard went hastily over the rest of the list. He handed it to Vince, who studied it with more care than anything Howard had ever seen.

“Right,” he said without a trace of humor, “now we have to sign it. This agreement states you can get out at any time, for any reason, but until you do you’re under my control.”

“What about, erm…” Howard drummed his fingers on the tabletop.

Vince grinned. “Come on. Say it aloud.”

Howard sighed. “Safe words, Vince. Does it have to be something special like...I dunno, Whisky Tango Foxtrot?”

“Well, the old standard is traffic light colors, you know, green for go, yellow for slow, red for stop.”

“What about a blinking yellow?” Howard asked cheekily. Vince hit him with a pillow.

“Right, your first offence. Let’s hurry up and sign this because you’ve got a lot coming to you.”

Howard took the pen and finished with a cursive swoop. Vince scrawled out his name in his painful script.

“Now,” Vince said archly, uncrossing his legs, “sit you across my lap, lad.”

“Excuse me?”

“I said we were starting right off, didn’t I?” Vince actually petted his lap.

Howard hugged himself. The self-consciousness, the years of repression still pinned him back from doing exactly what he wanted.

Vince watched him through half-lidded eyes.

“For every second you hesitate,” he said in a sudden smoky purr, “you get an extra ten.”

That was enough to propel Howard’s stiff legs over to the sofa, where he dutifully draped himself over Vince.

It was ridiculous. There was so much of him he wound up awkwardly spilling over the side of the sofa, making his ass kink up in an uncomfortable fashion. This was not helped when, on undoing Howard’s belt to let his trousers down, Vince giggled.

“”Just get on with it, alright?” Howard murmured.

That earned him a sharp slap right on the broad part of a cheek.

“Don’t talk back to me, young man,” Vince said primly.

“I was just—”

Slap.

“You were—”

Slap.

“Why—”

Slapslapslap.

 _Oh god._ Howard rotated his hips forward a little, pressing his budding erection to the crevice between Vince’s legs. The irritation had fallen away, leaving in its place a gnawing, craven hunger. Yes. he was being punished. Why? For the most arbitrary reason imaginable. And it was utterly delicious.

Vince hit with his open palm, the meat of his hand taking the brunt of the impact. With every hit, the flesh on Howard’s arse rippled in a brief echo of the force he’d used. He started on Howard’s right cheek, transferred to the left after fifty or so, and then would randomly shift back to the right for a single smack. The broken rhythm made it so that Howard never grew accustomed to the pain. Every new blow was fresh and it made him shudder with delight.

Vince switched to the tender area on the back of Howard’s inner thigh, making him yelp. Vince stopped for a moment as if savoring the noise, and then did it again, harder. Howard could not contain the squeak it produced. Rhythmically and methodically, Vince worked the tender area over, sometimes switching up his strokes to Howard’s glowing-red cheeks.

Howard was trying very hard not to grind his erection into his best friend's lap. It was a losing battle. He was very, very close to coming when all the sudden, Vince stopped.

Howard gasped. Had he done something wrong? He snuck a look back at Vince, who was examining his fingernails nonchalantly.

“Vince?” he said weakly. “Erm...green?”

Vince put down his hand, resting it casually on Howard’s arse. “Oh, you want me to finish? You can ask nicely, then.”

Any other time, he would have shouted at Vince for being a twat. But need was pushing at the back of his throat so that he could only just barely croak: “please?”

Vince took his sweet time, sighing and rolling his eyes like it was all so much of a bother, _there’s the milk to put out and the gas bills due but Howard wants me to spank his arse first_ , and then hit Howard with a blow that made his eyes water. Howard’s hips buckled, his erection burning from the friction of the fabric wadded up around it. Another blow, and a fold of the kimono worked away, leaving a tantalizing caress of Vince’s inner thigh.

Howard’s eyes widened. Surely Vince wouldn’t—

SMACK.

Howard bucked into the couch, Vince’s thighs graciously parting to let him past, and came.

He lay limp across Vince’s lap, panting and sweating with his arse glowing like a coal.

Vince pet his right cheek. “All right, Howard?”

Howard swallowed. “All right,” he managed shakily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'll just add tags for the different practices as I go, it seems best that way. and for those curious about what figging is...don't google it. I beg you.


	3. Feng shui

_I sneak around from behind_  
_I got a one track mind  
_ _We got a skin on skin thing, baby_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Skin on Skin”

Vince was eating a banana, and he was doing it entirely on purpose.

Howard didn’t need the sidelong glances while they were watching Colobos the Crab to tell him that. Vince took his sweet time, sliding his lips down little by little, careful to take only a little at a time so as to extend the torture as long as he possibly could.

Howard had carefully positioned every part of his body as far away from Vince as he could get while still on the same sofa. This was more or less normal for him, so much so that Naboo didn’t waste a second glance on them as he popped his head into the room.

“Right, going to the council of shamen, be back tomorrow morning.”

“I can’t believe they’re making you re-test for your shaman license,” Vince said, stretching out so his feet nearly touched Howard. Howard leaned away.

“Bloody unfair, I know.” Naboo shook his head. “That berk Tony ploughs into a yeti preserve while off his tits on Plutonic Mega-Molly, he gets a slap on the tentacle. But you summon one measly giant…”

“Erm, it _did_ rampage throughout the greater London area,” Howard ventured. Vince’s feet were dangerously close to making contact. It was actually worse than if they were touching him.

“Bullshit, I had it all in hand. They just came to show me up. Now Saboo won’t shut up about his bloody hat being missing.”

Vince snuck a glance at the coat hooks, where a very nice black Akubra currently hung next to this week’s feathery overcoat.

Something honked.

“Right, that’s my Uber. You ballbags stay out of my shit while I’m gone.” Naboo slammed the door behind himself.

Howard and Vince listened to the grunts of Naboo boarding the idling carpet and waited until they heard the whoosh of its departure.

Vince scooted forward until his feet, ankles and all, were draped over Howard’s lap.

Howard kept a straight face. It was prelude, but prelude to what, he didn’t know. And it was so much better when he didn’t know.

Vince kept shifting. The satin peacock-pattern pajamas he wore would crumple up in distracting patterns as he writhed, eyes on the television.

“I can’t get comfortable,” he whined.

Howard kept perfectly still.

Vince squirmed a little more. “I need a pillow or something. Hang on—”

What he grabbed was not a pillow, it was Howard’s hand. With cheeky grin, Vince tugged him up from the couch.

Vince undressed him, sliding off the turtleneck Howard had chosen because it didn’t have a lot of buttons and one of his secret terrors was trying to undress before sex and being stymied by an endless row of fasteners. He slid Howard’s trousers down but kept his pants on. With Howard nearly naked, Vince put a finger to his chin and tilted his head to the side. He began positioning Howard like he was a piece of furniture, placing his hands flat on the coffee table, guiding his legs with the touch of a hand. When he finished, Howard hunched parallel to the telly, feet apart, back horizontal. Vince nodded.

“Much better.”

Vince put a foot up on the sofa. Howard tensed, unsure of what came next.

Using the nearby floor lamp as support, Vince climbed up onto Howard’s back. Howard sucked in a breath, trying to compensate for the sudden weight. Vince half-lay, half-sat on Howard’s back so that his legs dangled over Howard’s shoulder and the elbow he used to prop himself up dug into Howard’s posterior.

Howard sweated, trembling with effort. How long could he hold this? And when he came down, would he send Vince tumbling as well?

“Vince,” he said in a strained voice.

Vince slapped him on the bum. “Furniture doesn’t talk.”

With the aid of a pillow snagged from the sofa, Vince reclined on Howard. His thick football-player’s calves dangled to either side of Howard’s head.

Howard grunted, face reddening with effort as he tried to sustain the position. It was like an interminable push-up, which brought sickening memories of gym class to dance about in his head. Humiliation thickened in his belly. Vince knew how hard sports were for him, how he hated showing his body and exerting himself.

God, the bloody little genius.

Vicne yawned. The calf next to Howard’s left ear lifted as Vince crossed his legs, centering the weight on one shoulder. Howard gulped a breath. It was so oddly stimulating, being ignored like this. His cock throbbed for want of attention. He could not spare a single hand to relieve himself,  and that just made him all the harder.

Vince shifted, perky little arse wiggling as he redistributed his weight. The constant motion made it difficult for Howard to remain stable...and that was probably the point. Vince, master torturer that he was, knew that.

Colobus faded into credits and Vince stretched. Howard, surprised by the action,  nearly spilled him like a basket of fruit. Vince sat up, sliding his legs down Howard’s sides so that he now sat astride.

“All right there, Howard?” He patted Howard’s shoulder comfortingly.

Howard let out a small explosion of breath. He was quite incapable of anything else at the moment. He could feel Vince’s heat, feel the softness of his balls and the semi-hardness above it as Vince shifted, squeezing his ribcage a bit. Howard gasped, arms shaking with nearly-spent strength.

Vince did not seem at all concerned. He kicked his feet back and forth at Howard’s sides like a child might, humming to himself.

“I’d like to go to bed now, I think.” he leaned forward so that his stomach lay flat against Howard’s back and—yes, yes, there was his hard little cock, digging into the soft flesh below Howard’s ribs. “I’d like a ride there.”

Howard gasped again. Standing up was difficult, their combined weights made him nearly tip the other way as he shoved off with his hands. Once he cleared the halfway mark it was deceptively easy, he found that his body wanted to keep going backwards once he was completely vertical. He flailed his arms in front in a desperate counterbalance. Vince clung to his back, giggling in childish delight. Once gravity was on his side again, Howard shifted himself, hands going behind to support Vince’s bottom. Vince snaked his legs forward and locked them around Howard’s waist, arms encircling his neck.

Howard could spare a brief thought for how odd it must look before Vince squeezed his abdomen with his thighs. Howard plodded ahead, leaning forward to balance out the weight.

Once they reached his door, Vince said, “on second thought, I want something from the kitchen first.”

Howard repressed a sigh and turned around.

After plodding down the hall and through the living room, it was, “actually, I’ve not brushed my teeth yet.

At the bathroom door: “you know, I think I left my toothbrush in my room.”

Then: “you know, I think I’d prefer your room tonight.”

That request was met with special terror. Howard’s room was his sanctuary, his beige and brown refuge from the circus riot that was the rest of the flat. What if Vince’s plan was to spoil that somehow?

The word ‘red’ was the closest it had ever been to his lips as he opened the door with some fumbling and nearly fell in.

“Bed, please.”

Sweating, Howard made it across the floor in record time(unlike _some_ people, he believed in being able to see floor in a room) and turned to deposit Vince on the bed.

Vince made a show of stretching, yawning like a kitten as his pajamas shifted over the bulge at his front.

“Thanks, Howard.” Vince abruptly turned over and lay down.

Howard was left standing with an erection that felt more awkward than amorous. Pulse thudding in his ears, he was on the verge of asking further instructions when Vince shifted.

Vince moaned.

Vince writhed on the plain mahogany duvet.

“Howaaaaard,” he groaned, “I can’t get comfortable.”

He sat up in bed, scooting with his feet until he sat at the edge.

Howard flushed.

Vince pointed.

Howard took back the covers, carefully laying down so that he did not disturb Vince at the end of the bed. Vince smiled a self-satisfied little smirk and rolled himself backwards, spine tracing down Howard’s stomach until his head sat snug at Howard’s collarbone.

“This is genius, Howard, thanks,” he said, bouncing his hips a little so that Howard knew it was all very intentional. He took a shuddering breath.

Vince ground his arse back against Howard’s cock, smiling languidly as Howard fought to remain still as possible. The friction was almost-not-quite-enough and he was maddeningly close, so close but Vince remained teasingly faint, his coconut-scented hair was everywhere, the thick aroma driving Howard to shut his eyes and bury his nose in the locks and just _breathe_ —

The front door slammed.

Howard’s hips bucked upwards in surprise. His orgasm was already cooling by the time Vince dove from the bed with a cheeky grin, scuttling out the door and replacing it silently as he blew a kiss backwards at Howard.

Howard was left splayed flat on the sheets, listening to Bollo’s gruff baritone as he wished Vince a good night. Then Vince’s door slammed and there were kitchen sounds as Bollo made himself an after-DJ snack.

Howard pinched himself to make sure it was all real. It hurt. He smiled.


	4. The trousers of fate

_ It’s the cruelest joke to play _

_ I’m so high I run in place _

—Queens of the Stone Age, “In My Head”

 

“Simple clothes fitting,” Vince said, completely straightfaced, “nothing to it.”

“Yes, but—” Howard ducked his head just in case their landlord was anywhere within earshot, “is it a clothes fitting or a  _ clothes _ fitting?”

“Not sure what you mean.” Vince’s eyes dropped back to his magazine. Lovely. So his attention span was too short for this, now.

Bollo walked in, wiping a casserole pan. “Bollo be off in an hour. Precious Vince and ballbag must manage own dinner.”

“Yeah, thanks Bollo,” Vince said absently, eyes still very intent on his magazine, “we’ll be off for a band fitting, so we’ll probably just get something on the hoof.”

Bollo grunted in acknowledgement. Vince flipped a few pages.

It was all so bloody  _ normal _ . Howard felt like he was about to explode. ‘A simple clothes fitting.’ Did they even  _ do  _ simple things anymore?

The game(he had taken to calling it that in his head) had been underway for a good while now. As exciting as it was to suddenly lock gazes with Vince and drop into whatever madcap scenario spun from his brain, it was downright nerve-wracking sometimes. 

Vince peeked at the clock, like he’d ever run on schedule, and folded up his magazine. He flicked his head towards the door. They both got up and got their coats.

“Going out now, Naboo, be back in a few,” Vince called. A liquory grunt replied.

“I dunno why you bother,” Howard said as they tramped down the stairs. “He’s been swimming in that bottle since three in the afternoon.”

“Courtesy, like. Anyway, if he gets shirty, we can just say ‘well I told you we’d be out.’” Vince grinned and everything stopped mattering so much.

It was a power he had. Rules became more like guidelines,  _ never  _ became  _ perhaps _ , and the universe became a warmer place for about three seconds.

Howard smiled as they boarded the tubes.

Why had he befriended Vince in the first place? Was it the old saw about how opposites attract? Vince, golden boy of the universe, could not be more opposite to Howard if he tried. As he entered the car, a brief flicker of a smile was enough to part the crowds and let them both sit. Howard was still testing the waters, and as he sat he attempted to take Vince’s hand. Vince ducked it expertly, fishing a package of licorice bootlaces from his pocket.

Truth be told, he’d found Vince a bit obnoxious at first. Dominating the schoolyard with his tales of Bryan Ferry and India, spinning tales so wild Howard felt sure had to be untrue. And when he learned he was wrong he felt…

Vince squinted at an advert for The Black Tubes. A slight sneer curled his pretty mouth and he went back to jawing his candy.

Howard had felt not just the standard shame at being wrong again, he was...bereft. Sad, that something so wonderful could exist in the same world while he suffered. Something he was very sure he could never be part of.

Of course, Howard thought, bracing himself on either side with his hands, who had come blasting through that barrier? The laws of the universe just didn’t apply to Vince.

He felt a small, insistent peck at his pinky finger. Slowly, Vince’s hand crept like a crab until half their fingers were entwined. It was all Howard could do to keep himself from smiling.

No laws, no wall, no barrier strong enough to thwart Vince Noir.

“We get off here,” Vince said, not even bothering to hide his cheeky grin.

Howard focused on the pressure of their hands as they walked through the city. He was afraid if he lost that bit pinning him to the present, he would just float away from reality.

They wound up in front of a place called Maggie’s Rags. A stylized magpie dominated the window, some shiny piece of tat in its beak. Howard studied the front as Vince tugged him around the side.

“There’s no front door.”

Vince rolled his eyes. “Of course there isn’t. What do you think this is, Tesco’s?”

“Yes, but...isn’t the whole point of having a door to encourage clientele?”

Vince just gave him a sly look. Ah, so the game was on, then. Howard swallowed his misgivings and followed Vince.

The door was disguised as another piece of brick wall, the door handle masked by a bit of graffiti. Vince clicked the door open and a wave of clove-scented air rushed over them. Howard looked around nervously.

“Vince, are you sure this is all right? There aren’t any lights on.”

“Yeah. I know Maggie, she lets me have run of the place on off nights. I’m her coolest customer.”

Howard did not respond. He was looking at the walls.

And what was on the walls.

He supposed that there had to be a...place where people purchased their...gear. It couldn’t all be home-made, could it? But the reality had never really struck him before.

Vince hit him in the chest lightly. “Quit staring and come in.”

“So when you said ‘band fitting’...”

“Meant exactly what I said. Maybe his idea of band fitting and mine are a little different, but he don’t need to know about that, does he?”

“Well, why’d you even have to tell him we’re looking at clothing?”

Vince rolled his head back and let out a guffaw. “Crikey, you never snuck out as a kid?”

Howard gave him a cool stare. “I think we both know the answer to that one.”

Vince shook his head. “Look, if you give people nearly the whole kernel of truth, they’re not going to worry about the little pippin you keep back for yourself. They’re going to think, ‘eurgh, sure was great of Vince to let me have this kernel all to myself, maybe I’ll eat it with a little butter and—’”

“I think that metaphor’s getting away from you. Anyway, I get it.” Howard nervously glanced around. “So...what exactly are we doing here?”

Vince gave him a smokey look. He was dressed reminiscent of Joan Jett this evening, his eyeshadow was thick and dark. 

“I had her working on something for me. Be right back.”

He strutted to the rear of the store. Howard suppressed a shudder. A clothes store after closing. It was odd, but the unwelcoming ar of the place only heightened his excitement. Howard was not a natural rule-breaker. No, he left that to Vince.

The shoreditch vampire himself came traipsing back, what looked like two vinyl hosepipes draped over his outstretched arms. 

“Ta-daa!” he held them up for inspection. “Bondage trousers 2.0. I had her add extra buckles and fasteners.”

“That’s, erm, nice, Vince,” Howard said, wrinkling his forehead at the clothes, “but why are you showing me your new…”

The penny dropped, spinning end over end. Vince gave him a look of mock exasperation.

“Christ, you’re thick,” he said fondly. He held them up by the waist. Now Howard could see they never would have fit Vince. The legs were far too long and thin.

“I am never going to fit in those.”

“Course you will. They’re your measurements, exactly.”

“Exac—have you been measuring me in my sleep again?”

Vince was trying and failing to contain his laughter. “Just a bit. I do it during a barber visit. You sleep like a gavial with a full tummy anyway!”

“Right,” Howard said crisply, “I don’t think—”

“Howard?”

“Really, I can’t—”

“Howard?”

“...Yes?”

“Color?”

Howard looked down at the trousers, then up at Vince. He sighed. 

“Green,” he said resignedly. Vince dd a little victory hop as the trousers were taken from his hands.

“What shade of green,” he called after Howard, “is it a darker green or is it tinting towards chartreuse?”

“Cheeky bitch,” Howard said as the fitting room door shut behind him.

God, they were like every clothes-related nightmare he’d ever had rolled into one. He eyed a buckle like it was going to bite him. He couldn’t even see how he would begin to put them on.

“Do you need me to help you?” Vince called teasingly through the door. 

Howard growled a little to himself. “No thank you!”

They were trousers, weren’t they? Howard Moon knew how to put on a pair of trousers, thank you very much.

Howard got down to his shorts and a horrible thought came to him.

“Vince?”

“Ye-es?” he sounded impatient.

“When you measured me…?”

He didn’t even have to finish the question. Howard could practically hear the smirk in Vince’s voice.

“Pants off, Howard. There’s talcum powder in case you need help.”

Howard looked at the chair that held his discarded clothes and took a deep breath. He didn’t need help, he needed divine intervention.

The legs slid on deceptively smoothly, clinging like eels to his calves as he carefully worked them up past his thighs. God, he really did have long, thin legs didn’t he? They literally looked like two hosepipes coming from his hips.

He was spared from having to make a very delicate decision when he pulled the waist up and found there was a neat little compartment at the crotch. Of course there was. Vince, who would sew pockets for library cards, would think of such things.

As he tugged the trousers up, the seams slid into their intended place and his heart gave a little jump. Ah. So that was the attraction behind them. It was unnerving, almost like he was being touched all over at once.

He took an experimental step and shivered. It felt like they were alive, writhing over his naked skin.

Vince was already smirking down at his crotch when Howard stepped out of the fitting room. “Didn’t take long, did it?” He wasn’t referring to the act of donning the trousers.

“This is a fresh new brand of humiliating, you know that?”

“I think we’ve actually found a good look for you.” Vince craned his neck, looking Howard up and down.

Howard flushed, shifting in place. “So what now?”

“Now?”Vince looked up innocently as if he’d forgotten what they were doing. “Oh. right.”

He reached out and threaded a bit of leather through a buckle. As it tightened, it forced Howard’s legs together. Vince repeated the act with several buckles situated at strategic points around Howard’s legs until he stood teetering.

Howard was sweating. Now it was like a large python had encased his legs, wrapping him and preventing him from getting away.. A thin moan made its way out his nose.

Vince sat on a counter, nodding in satisfaction.

“Knew this would do it.” he let his chin rest on cupped hands. “You look a treat.”

“Vince,” Howard said, struggling to keep his voice level, “I’m really...I think I’m having circulation problems.”

“Wonder why?” Vince showed no signs of moving from his perch.

Howard sweated and swayed. Okay. things had gotten off to a promising start. Now what?

He tried taking a very small step forward. He nearly fell. While he was pinwheeling his arms, Vince slid from the countertop and caught him. 

“Now, now,” he admonished, “what am I going to do with you if you can’t obey simple instructions?”

Before Howard could reach out and grab him, Vince skipped backwards a few steps and held out his arms.

“Here. Come to me.” The tone was gentle but firm, no trace of humor in Vince’s face or voice.

Howard swallowed. The sweat was making the vinyl seal to his skin like clingfilm. He had a brief terrified vision of having to be cut free by an EMT while a goggling crowd looked on.

He took a step. It equated to less than three inches, but Vince applauded nonetheless. He took another. Then another. He began to work out the balance, spreading his toes for support. His cock, in its private prison, rubbed eagerly against the containing fabric. 

Sweating, straining, he was one step away from Vince.

Vince stepped backwards.

Howard gaped. Vince looked at him expectantly.

“Well?” he asked.

Howard grunted and moved forward, faster this time. Vince, quite innocent, took another big step backward.

The race was on.

Vince walked backwards through the store and Howard followed with great effort. Every time it felt like he was getting close, Vince moved away. His cock was thriving in captivity, the friction and pressure put on by the pouch worked together with the slimy-slick feeling of the vinyl.

He came, gasping, just as Vince let him stumble into his arms. Vince held Howard as he recovered, rubbing up and down the damp flesh of his back.

“Right,” he said after enough time had passed. “Get those off and we’ll put them back.”

“What?” Howard drew away. “I thought she made them for you.”

“She did, but now they’ve got to be cleaned.” Vince batted him in the chest. 

Howard nodded. Of course, yes, he should’ve known that. Vince loosened the buckles and he dutifully went to change.

As he buttoned up his shirt, Howard spared a glance at the trousers now dangling from the clothes-hook. They weren’t so bad, come to think of it. He really did have handsome, thin legs, didn’t he?

“Get a move on, Howard.”

Howard rolled his eyes and slid the curtain back.

 

They were back in time for  _ Captain Cabinets _ . As they sat on the sofa, Naboo stumbled in. He eyed the two of them suspiciously from one bloodshot eye.

“Thought you were going to a band fitting. You finished already?”

“Yep,” they replied in unison, keeping their eyes trained to the screen. Naboo looked from one to the other, shook his head, then lurched into the kitchen.

Something fluttered at Howard’s hand. He lifted up to accept Vince’s fingers, twining them together with his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow, this chapter ended up being a lot longer than anticipated.


	5. How to handle a rope

_I’ve got mine_   
_And so do you_   
_Mine came with a cord  
I wish yours did too_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Broken Box”

 

“I think we’ve finally found a good look for you,” Vince snickered.

Howard rolled his eyes. He wasn’t in a position to do much else. Literally.

They’d been looking up shibari forms on the internet and decided to try one called “Butterfly in Black and Grey.” Sadly, since there was nothing in the flat that would support Howard’s hanging weight, they were forced to modify it slightly. Now Howard bent backwards over the table, one leg tucked beneath him, the other bracing the floor for support. A line of knots wound their way down his front, leaving a gap just big enough for his cock before looping around his upper thighs. His arms were tied in a mild approximation of wings, small reef-knots between each finger.

“I feel a twat,” Howard said.

It was odd. It should have done something for him, even the clumsy single-person attempts had set him off.

Vince had the laptop before him, squinting at the screen. “I’ve got it right, though. You look just like the diagram.”

“Vince, this isn’t origami.”

“Too bad. I’d have fun folding you wrong.” Vince chuckled.

Howard shook his head. “Look, maybe we should just call it a wash.”

“Wait, wait.” Vince put a hand out. “What’s your main problem with it?”

Howard pondered this. Was it the cold surface of the table beneath his arse? The way his balls strained against the rope just enough to hurt slightly? The fact that he could feel bruises blooming already where the knots pressed into his skin?

No, those were all pluses.

“I guess I just don't feel restricted enough,” he admitted. “After all, isn’t that the point?”

Vince clicked his tongue. “Wait a minute, I think I’ve got a fix.” He tapped away on the keys.

Howard sighed. His erection was flagging. If, a year ago, you had asked him to describe bondage, the word “boring” would not be amoungst the adjectives.

Vince clapped his hands and stood up. Of course, he hadn’t bothered to dress differently for the session. He had his signature cream-white hat with his Camden Cowboy getup, fluffy feather boa and all.

Vince stepped to either side of Howard’s support leg. Howard did not like his smile.

“Not restricted enough?” Vince repeated.

Howard felt sweat break out on his forehead. “Actually, now that I think on it—”

Vince took hold of one of the crossing straps on Howard’s chest and pulled steadily. It slid like butter through the retaining knots, drawing his elbows together behind Howard’s back until they held him up.

“Vince,” he said in a crackly voice.

Vince tugged on another, tightening the rope in a few strategic places. Namely, his cock. That shut Howard right up.

“The thing you really have to remember,” Vince said as placidly as if he was explaining the difference between rayon and silk, “is which strand is the bight and which is the turn. Once you’ve got that, knots are a cinch. So to speak.”

Howard groaned. It took a lot of effort to support his weight like this. The tension made his erection jut out like a pin from a cushion. And all the while, Vince kept playing with the ropes, tightening here, loosening there. Howard’s  body was completely at the mercy of his bindings. And it was utterly perfect.

“You know,” Vince said as he wrapped a strand several times around Howard’s aching cock, “I should do this for a living. I’m pretty good at it, wouldn’t you say?”

Howard moaned, the most intelligible response he was capable of at the moment. _Pleasepleaseplease_ …

Vince tugged, tightening the rope. Howard’s head glistened redly between the rope’s green fibers.

“I already do this, anyway. Tell people what to do.” Vince glanced around as if he was doing something menial, like filing papers. “I’m the god of fashion, the Vishnu of vogue. It’d be a small step to—”

“ _Goodgod_!” Howard gasped, spending himself.

Vince looked slightly annoyed. “That’s it?”

“Yeah.” Howard took recovery breaths. “It’s wasn’t just the rope. It was the...ignoring me.”

Vince raised an eyebrow. “Really? So what would happen if I ignored you for an hour or so while I went to make tea?”

“Vince.”

“Yes?”

He didn’t have to say the word ‘red.’ Vince rolled his eyes and loosened one knot. In a domino effect, the others lost their grip until Howard was left slithering in a pile of rope. He groaned, joints screaming in agony as he struggled to stand.

“Christ, I should really stretch before we do this,” he said.

“There should be a pre-bondage workout. Hang on.” Vince mock-tapped at a few keys. Howard swiped him on the bottom.

“Go make that tea, you.”

While Vince left giggling to the kitchen, Howard wound the rope up, fisherman’s style. It was almost deceptively domestic, what they had. If Howard didn’t know any better, he would get suspicious that the universe was getting ready to drop another anvil on his head.

But that was impossible. He had Vince.

“Right,” Vince said crisply as he walked back into the room, “now that that’s done with, I’ve got something to show you.”

Howard sighed. “Vince, if it’s another funny animal video…”

Vince looked incensed. “Howard, it’s important. Come with me.”

Howard slipped on his pants. Whenever he was naked too long, he started to get paranoid. But when he reached for the rest of his clothes, Vince snatched them back.

“Come follow me first.”

Howard obeyed, feeling just a bit off. Vince took him to the corner of his room that functioned as the fashion station. Here he stored his psychedelic fabrics, the sewing machine, and his dressmaker’s dummy.

...which was currently occupied by clothes in no way, shape, or form like Vince’s usual outfit.

The dummy held a steely-blue jacket and trousers made of some sort of shimmery fabric. They were very nearly formal, but the lapels were more like something that came off Vince’s Carnaby frock coat. The shirt beneath them was a subtle patterning of dark blues against darker blues. The shirt’s front collar had a U-shaped dip instead of wings, something a trendy pseudo-eastern cult leader might wear to the clubs.

It was all very nice, but too restrained and conservative for Vince’s normal attire.

“It’s...nice,” he began, but Vince was too excited to let him finish.

“I had to let extra room around the tummy and shoulders,” he said, breezing past Howard to point it out, “but the trousers were the tricky part. I made them double lined, so even if you have a really rough sisal cord running through it won’t show.”

Howard stared for a moment as the snowmelt of his thoughts trickled down.

“You—made this—for me?” he croaked.

“Now he gets it!” Vince grinned teasingly. “Wide enough to accommodate any...equipment you might want between it, but still hangs flatteringly. Can’t have you looking too shabby while we’re out.”

“Out?”

“Out. Out on the town.” Vince pet the sleeve. “Wouldn’t it be amazing? On the outside you’d be like a respectable geography-teacher-type, but on the inside, you’d be squirming with vice. Like a kinky superhero.”

Howard’s social anxiety flared like a fire someone tried to extinguish with jet fuel. “Vince...I can’t. I just can’t.”

Vince frowned. “Come on. You’ve made so much progress. You can get naked with my back turned, I don’t have to leave the room anymore!”

“Yes, and I’m proud of that,” Howard managed through a throat that was cinching tight on him, “But this is a big step. This is like tossing me to the deep end after I’ve learned how to blow bubbles.”

Vince crossed his arms and pouted. “You’re ready for more than you think.”

“So you want me to paint the town _red?”_

Vince got the meaning.

“All right, all right.” he threw up his hands. “But at least try it on.”

Minutes later, Howard looked at himself in the mirror. Turned this way and that. Put his hands on his hips. He did look sharp. Vince was a good tailor.

Vince’s foxy little face popped into the space beneath his arm. “Now, we just need to sort your hair out and you’d be perfect.”

“Is there a shibari form for that?”

Vince tossed a pillow at him. “Go get changed, you. I’ve got to hang that back up.”

“What, is it too precious to stay on my body now? I feel like some fresh chips. The greasy kind. And lots of sauce.”

Vince looked aghast. “You wouldn’t dare.”

Howard laughed right out of his trousers. Vince made him pick them up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Butterfly in black and grey" is not, to my knowledge, a real shibari form.  
> but if it becomes one after this i totally call firsties.


	6. My dinner with awkward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: the following chapter contains 0% sex and the phrase "Little Jimmybob’s Bondage pool for suckers."  
> proceed at your own caution

_Where's this going to_   
_Can I follow through_   
_Or just follow you  
For a while_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Vampyre of Time and Memory”

“Scene rule #1,” Vince was saying as he shrugged on a sharkskin jacket, “meet and be familiar with other people in the scene. Helps cut down on the risk of shady business.”

“I thought rule #1 was ‘have a safeword.’ how many rule #1’s are there?”

Vince contemplated his own chin in the mirror. “Quite a bit. They’re all important, so they’re ranked according to that, rather than, say...numerity.”

“Congratulations, you’ve managed to muddle numerical and grammatical systems in the same sentence.” Howard set his porkpie firmly on his scalp. He was sweating a little, despite the evening chill.

Vince had given him no heads-up, no ‘hey Howard, I've found another kinky couple I think we should meet with and discuss whips and sodomy over tea.’ Probably because if he had, Howard would have bolted like he was seriously considering right now.

“Are you sure they’re...discreet? It’s not some Johnny Turncoat who’ll out us in broad daylight unless he gets a pack of cash in a men’s toilet every month?”

“Your paranoid delusions are getting more intricate than normal. That means it’s time to go,” Vince pronounced, fussing over Howard’s coat collar. “Look, it’s just a normal-ish dinner at that new eastern fusion place. You know, the one where all the cutlery and flatware is edible?”

“Fantastic. So when I start swallowing my own knife it won’t just be a cry for help, it’ll be an hors d'oeuvre.”

Vince gave the collar one last sweep and grinned. “That’s the idea. C’mon, let’s get going.”

He started for the front door.

“I’m going to be extra awkward, just so you know,” Howard called. “If I should spontaneously collapse during dinner, please take no great measures to revive me.”

He had put his foot down, quite firmly, from day one: no taking it public. The only way Vince had managed to finagle this one was the promise of no play: no ropes, no orders, nothing they wouldn’t do in a library. Vince, after some eye-rolling and cajoling, had agreed.

The taxi dropped them off at a little place that had drum and bass/sitar music streaming from behind the beaded fringe that served as a front door. Howard gave it a dubious glance and then looked at Vince, who looked unconvincingly certain.

“All right, they said they’d get the table before we got here. They should be in there, waiting.”

Vince nudged him forward. The curtain made a hissing noise as Howard passed through it, like even it was displeased with him.

The maître d' was a bloke with slicked-back hair and a nehru jacket. An iguana the size of a lapdog perched on his shoulder, wearing an identical lizard-sized jacket. Howard tried very hard not to stare.

“Erm, Réage table for four?” Vince ventured.

The maître d' nodded, the orange fairy lights that stood in for proper bulbs glinting off his greasy scalp. “This way, sirs.”

They picked their way through various pretentious couples lounging at low tables on giant cushions. It looked like an opium den crossed with a hipster cafe. Howard had to tamp down the urge to step on a few of them, especially the bloke with the pirate moustache and ill-fitting straw boater who shot him a dirty look. Howard’s blood was already up by the time they reached the table, where their presumed tablemates were hidden behind giant, multi sectional menus.

“Alright? Sorry we’re a bit late, this place is really hard to find in the dark.” Vince plopped sidesaddle on a cushion. It took far more maneuvering to get Howard’s legs under the table, and quite a bit of bumping into everyone else’s legs. He was blushing bright red by the time the waiter came by with the lime-barley-coriander-comfrey water and two more menus.

“Right,” Howard said, “so maybe we should order and then–MONTY PYTHON’S FLYING FUCK, WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING HERE?”

The menus dropped, disclosing the unmistakable visages of Bob Fossil and Dixon Bainbridge.

“This is the other scene couple,” Vince said with a cringing smile, “...surprise?”

Fossil was dressed in a white linen shirt which, yes, he had also failed to button properly. There was far more grey in Bainbridge’s mustache, and already he teetered with drink.

“Moon? By Lucrezia Borgias’s tits, how are you?”

Howard opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to process this information. “This is the scene couple? You couldn’t get anyone else?”

“Like who?”

“Like _literally_ anyone else?” Howard growled.

“Hey, we’re as good at domininating as the next couple of guys,” Fossil replied in his signature nasal whinge, “we’re like, super pro at it by now. You guys have just been doggy-paddling in Little Jimmybob’s Bondage pool for suckers.”

“Ah yes, two sentences into the evening and you’ve already set a record  for butchering the English language,” Howard said, “tell me, do they beam all television signals to your home planet or just reruns of _BJ and the Bear_?”

“Hey, I love BJ!”

A few couples looked round at that outburst. Howard was past embarrassment, though. Vince had sank back behind the scant cover of his menu.

Bainbridge suppressed a belch. “Noir, your submissive has an awfully active tongue for one of his station. I suggest you do something to curb that.”

Vince lowered the menu. “Hey, Howard can spout off as much as he’d like. We’re not doing a scene now, I don’t own him.”

Bainbridge shook his head. “One must have the reigns in hand if one expects to stay in command. I learned as much while hunting the great spangled rhino in Rangoon. The hornéd bastard nearly ran right through my elephant mount, threw the mahout into the Bago river where he was eaten by several river orphans. I had to fashion a spear from a broken tusk and the remains of my rifle, but the endangered prick went down in the end. ' _Last male of his kind'_ my aching yellow arse!” Bainbridge laughed exactly twice and downed his drink.

Vince and Howard blinked.

“Right, so what the fuck does any of this have to do with bondage?” Howard asked.

Vince laid a hand on his forearm.

Bainbridge shrugged unsteadily. “Dunno. But it netted me a bloody great big umbrella stand.”

Howard put his face in his hands and sighed.

“Bainbridge and I have a 24/7/36 relationship I think is what he meant,” Fossil put in. He leaned forward. “He tells me to eat dirt, I say, ‘clay or sand?’ He tells me to get to my knees, I say, ‘which knees?’ he asks me to smother an Irishman before he blows our cover, I say, ‘I can’t, he’s my uncle Bibby!’ and he says, ‘then make him eat dirt,’ and I get to my knees and do it.”

Howard stared at him for a few beats. “There is something seriously wrong with both of you, I hope you know that.”

Fossil snorted and pretended his hand was a telephone. “Hello, pot? This is kettle. You’re short and smell like fish.”

They hadn’t even ordered yet. The waiter was studiously ignoring Howard’s signals. Vince was working on his dinner plate, gnawing relentlessly at the edge while looking off into the distance with a glazed look.

Would they have to suffer through dinner with these two prize tools?

“The thing you have to understan’,” Bainbridge slurred, “is that you have to be in control. Aftercare is for old women and circus freaks. ‘Go hard or go home,’ I say, and if your sub’s arse isn’t red as a stoplight by the end of the evening, you haven’t done your job.”

“Yeah, Moon. Everyone knows that ‘no’ doesn’t mean ‘no,’ it means ‘go faster, the flight attendant’s headed this way!’”

"Fossil, if we weren't seated I'd kick you in the cock."

"You gotta stop doing that M'Bainbridge, I think it went inside me last time."

"Don't you raise your voice to me, you mealy-mouthed berdache!"

Howard met Vince’s eye. He mouthed the word ‘red.’

Vince nodded ever so slightly.

“Right, boys,” he said as they stood up as quickly as possible, Howard struggling not to upend the table, “we have to go to the bathroom. One of Howard’s...cock...flaps has come undone.”

Howard groaned from behind his hand.

Fossil gave them a knowing look. “I know what that means.”

“We all know what that means, you stupid prick,” Howard said, “it’s not in code.”

Fossil shrugged.

“Why are you gathering your coats then? And why are you going to the front door? The bathroom’s that way.” Bainbridge pointed a wavering thumb behind them.

“Yeah, well...we thought we’d use the bathroom of the sweet shop down the street,” Howard said, “gives more of a thrill that way.”

Fossil gave them a wink unsubtle as an explosion.

“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Howard muttered to Vince.

They raced to the front door, stepping on a trendy leg here, a plaid scarf there. It was a photo finish. They bolted from the bead curtain at the same time, breathless with repressed laughter.

Vince looked at Howard, the same thing written on both their faces.

“Did that really just happen?” Howard said.

“Hang on, let me check if I haven’t died and gone to purgatory.” Vince patted himself down.

Howard faced up to the moon and let out a guffaw. “Bloody rhino!”

“Cock flaps,” Vince giggled behind his hand. They both lost it then.

Picking their way down the sidewalk, Howard put an arm around Vince’s shoulders to steer him free of a puddle and then left it there.

“I can’t believe I thought this was a good idea,” Vince admitted, “Fossil sounded a lot more coherent over the phone.”

“I don’t think Dixon’s been coherent since the charge of the light brigade.”

“Yeah, Fossil tells me he’s been drinking since he lost the zoo. Don’t think hunting does it for him anymore, to be honest.”

“Looks like Fossil doesn’t do it for him anymore. What on earth keeps them together?”

Vince shrugged. “Dunno. I guess their relationship and ours really aren’t alike.”

Everything in Howard went very still for a second. “Relationship?”

“Yeah, like, I think theirs is based in contempt while we’re more based in...dunno, music? Anyway, we’re mates. That’s why we work.”

Howard swallowed around the lump that had formed in his throat. “Right, yes, right.”

“But I guess it was pretty helpful in that it showed us how not to be. I mean, just because you’re a sub don’t mean you’re not in charge. And it don’t mean I get to rough you up whenever it pleases me.” Vince jogged Howard with his elbow. “Funny, I always thought that you and Bainbridge had a bit of a—”

“Right,” Howard said primly, “I'm going to stop you there. There was—and is—nothing that would interest me in that berk. Okay, I'll admit I had a bit of a... fascination with him. There was this...way he had. It plucked at me.”

“Like a guitar string?” Vince asked mock-seriously.

“Yes. like an aimless fumbling for a chord. It told me where I could go to get what I wanted, but it itself wasn’t what I wanted...does that make sense?”

“Perfect.” Vince was grinning off to the side. Howard shook his shoulders a little, then drew him in tighter. For warmth.

“I think you’re improving too. Getting better about expressing yourself. You didn’t even care all those berks in the restaurant were staring at us.”

Howard nearly stopped dead. “S-staring? Were they staring?”

“Yeah,” Vince sneered, “in their little sailor tops and boater hats they were sneering at us. ‘Ooargh, someone’s expressing emotion in our ironic restaurant. I’d eat me ‘at if it were sprouted quinoa.’”

Howard laughed, feeling rushing back to his body. “Right. Yes. ironic tossers.”

“Though, if you’re still peckish I snuck an edible napkin out. Spun protein microfiber.”

“I’d rather eat your jacket.”

They walked home, laughing the whole way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, the name Réage is totally a 'The Story of O' reference.


	7. Double Bind

_Tears of pleasure_   
_Tears of pain_ _  
They trickle down your face the same_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “If I Had a Tail”

Howard had a word. And he was never, never, ever going to say it.

Howard noodled absently at the piano keys. Naboo lurched into the room, turban in disarray, and then slurred something that was probably meant to be an insult. He’d failed the shaman’s test for the ninth time in a row last night and as a result was hitting the lowest rock bottom Howard had seen so far. The shaman had grown his beard out so that he looked almost Sikh, and his eyes had more or less permanent bags beneath them.

Vince was on the sofa, flipping through Cheekbone. There was an androgynous model on the front cover dressed in what looked like colored cellophane, fake gems sparkling from every point on their face. “The shiny issue!” it pronounced. Howard wondered if every issue wasn’t the shiny issue and their intended audience just had a short attention span.

Bollo emerged from the kitchen, finishing the dregs of his tea.

“Bollo take Naboo with him to DJ.” The gorilla helped the shaman with his coat. “You two going out?”

And Howard did not say the word.

“Actually, I'm taking a quiet night in. might catch some Godard on the telly, you know?” he fluttered the C and E keys.

“I might go to the Neon Stingray later, promised Jaques I’d help vet his latest arm candy. Hear she’s a polyhedron. Dunno how he thinks it’ll work out.”

And Vince sat there and was just so utterly, utterly Vince that—

Howard was not going to say it.

“Remember last time, he dated a sphere? The fallout was terrible.”

“Cor, I’d forgotten that.” Vince lowered the magazine. “Plus, turned out she was just a beach ball.”

“No wonder she was passed around so much.” Vince and Howard shared a chuckle

Naboo wrinkled his brow and looked from one to the other, as if there was a snag somewhere he couldn’t quite figure out.

Howard held his breath and pretended he was very interested in the keyboard.

“No wait up on our account, then,” Bollo grunted, and pulled Naboo into the hall.

“Poor Naboo,” Vince said, “he’s really taking this hard, isn’t he?”

Mustn't say it, mustn't say it.

“I think the liquor cabinet is taking it harder. Saw him drink from a bottle with something floating in it the other day. Think it was a cobra.”

Vince looked up from his page. “No way! The vintage shéjiǔ? He used to say the stuff was too valuable to drink!”

“Well, what is wine if not for drinking?”

“It was made by an ancient sorcerer, it was supposed to be for subjugating the nine-headed serpent of the flood.”

“Oh.”

Vince primly shook his head as he flipped a page. _Oh._

“Think I might turn in, actually,” Howard said, the words forming independently of his brain. His brain had taken up residence on the sofa next to Vince and was never coming back. “It’s been a long day, what with the shop and everything.”

Vince stretched. A bit of his midriff showed, white skin and sparse, dark hairs that sprinkled his lower abdomen. “Have fun then.”

Howard did not say it. He turned the keyboard off and then did a few dishes and brushed his teeth and washed his face and shaved and got into his pajamas and closed his door and sat on the bed.

Someone knocked.

Howard opened the door and Vince grabbed a handful of his shirt, tugging him back into the livingroom.

“You think you can just go to bed and leave me?” Vince asked mischievously, “I'm bored. I need entertainment.”

Howard wasn’t going to say it. No matter how he was pressed, he would not give it utterance.

Vince positioned Howard in front of the kitchen table and began winding rope around his wrists, pulling them behind his back. Howard had nothing on under his pajamas, he could feel the texture of the rope even through the thin cotton. He shivered. No, no, not going to say it.

The rope tonight was a stouter weave, longer than anything they had used so far. Vince drew the ends down and through Howard’s legs, then up and around his neck. He tied a loop just loose enough not to be a danger, then wound the free end through Howard’s mouth.

Howard momentarily blanked. It was like he had heard Coltrane for the first time, he was excited and upset all at once. The rope wasn’t quite enough to be an effective gag, he could still say the word if he really wanted to, but he wouldn’t. Howard’s tongue lay pinned behind the rope as Vince knotted it yet again and led it downwards. His knees were cuffed, followed by his ankles. The remaining length was brought back to Howard’s wrists, where it joined the other end. Full circle.

Howard was glossed with sweat, breathing heavily through his nose. The rope did not feel like it was constricting him anymore, it felt like it was holding him together. Vince was holding him together.

And he would never say it.

Vince petted hair away from his face. He had on a loose black satin shirt, black drainpipes, black eyeliner. He looked like a raven that a wizard had turned into a pretty, pretty lady.

“Comfy?” he asked.

Howard gave a muffled reply.

That earned him a sharp spank.

“I didn’t say you could speak.”

Howard nodded.

Another spank.

“Or move. Now, are you comfortable?”

Howard kept silent and still as a statue.

“Oho, so you’re not going to tell me, eh?” Vince leered. “We have ways of dealing with ne-er-do-wells like you.” His heels tapped smartly on the linoleum as he left to fetch something.

The first strike caught Howard by surprise. He bent and looked upside-down and backwards at Vince, who was dangling something from his fingers.

It was one of Howard’s belts, stout brown leather. Howard had a sudden flash of the flagellants martyring themselves one strike at a time. He was instantly hard.

“How about now?” Smack. “Are you going to tell me.” Smack. “Whether you’re comfortable?” Smack. “Or do I have to.” Smack. “Keep going?” Smack.

Howard’s breath stuttered in his chest. Vince was licking him with the belt, teasing him with the very end of it. Howard wanted the flat stripe of it to come down on him. So he nodded.

“What.” Smack. “Did.” Smack. “I.” Smack. “Say.” Smack. “About.” Smack. “Moving?” _Smacksmacksmack_.

Howard hunched forward, bum burning, his whole body burning. He must not say it, he must not say it, he must not say it.

He shrugged.

“Cheeky little imp.” Smack. “I suppose you think that’s funny.” Smack. “Well, we’ll see if you’re still laughing tomorrow.” Smack.

Oh god, the bruising. To look down at his own arse and see the marks Vince left. To touch them and remember how it felt.

Howard’s breath caught in his chest.

“I told you to entertain me, but you’re just being boring now.” Vince fake-yawned. “Might make myself some toast.” Smack. “Or tea.” Smack. “Ooh, maybe there’s something good on telly!” Smack. “Nothing in black-and-white.” Smack. “That’s for boring people.” Smack.

Howard rocked slightly in time with the blows. He was being treated like a thing. He was being treated like a distraction. He was being treated like an annoyance.

And he was being considered. He was being listened to. He was being given exactly what he wanted, how he wanted it.

He couldn’t say the word. Not to Vince.

“Are you even listening?” SMACK. “Don’t you ignore me.” SMACK. “I didn’t drag you back out here to do that.” SMACK.

With the last stripe, Howard’s knees went weak. His orgasm jetted down his leg, slithering past knots and ropes as he sank bonelessly to the table. He rested his hot forehead against the surface, breathing. Someone played with his hair.

Vince was looking down at him, tilting his head so his fringe feathered into his eyes, his blue, blue eyes. Vince was black and blue. Vince had beat him black and blue. With gentle fingers, he picked and plucked at the knots until they came undone. He unwound the rope around Howard’s neck, and eased the strand from Howard’s mouth.

“All right, then?” he asked.

“I love you,” Howard gasped.

Vince gave him a strange look.

“Alright,” he said, and got his coat and left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A WILD CLIFFHANGER APPEARS!!!  
> Don't worry, my dears, this will not turn into an interminable angst-fest. would I do that to you? *evil grin*


	8. Howard's inner zombie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, 0% sex in this chapter. more soul-searching, Peter-Gabriel-blasting-from-an-upheld-boombox type things

_Where oh where have you been my love?_   
_Where oh where can you be?_   
_It's been so long since the moon has gone  
And oh what a wreck you've made me_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “This Lullaby”

 

Howard sprawled bonelessly out on the sofa in soiled pajamas. The last remnant of the joy he had shared with Vince stuck to his inner thigh. Howard was too thickly in despair to be disgusted.

Well, this was it. Total, entropic death. The thing he had feared most was here. He had killed that which was most precious in the world, squeezed the life from the only bit of sunshine in his life. Howard TJ Moon had finally overshot himself and wrecked upon the shoals of life's topographic oceans.

And the zombie of Howard’s will climbed out from the ruin and asked, _‘so?’_

What ‘so’? The worst possible thing had happened!

_And yet he was still standing…_

Look, it didn't matter if he hadn't crumbled dramatically into a pillar of salt, Vince had left him.

_But he hadn’t come right out and said no, he didn’t love Howard, had he?_

Howard sat up. Dangerous, poisonous hope was beginning to bubble up in his chest.

_Suppose, suppose…_

No, Howard decided, he couldn’t afford to hope. He had to pack his bags and flee to a himalayan monastery, toute suite.

_Yes, he could give up and scatter. Or he could confront Vince and ask what the problem was._

...No, he couldn't.

_Yes he could._

He could be humiliated by not taking the hint so generously gift wrapped for him.

_Look, Vince had seen him naked. He'd seen his cock up close and personal for fuck’s sake. How was this any more humiliating than that?_

Nudity was different.  This was emotional nudity, the worst kind.

_But if he pressed, he could make Vince emotionally naked, too._

...He could?

_This hadn't been a lark. For either of them. Even in the depths of his pity and self-loathing,  Howard had to see that. Vince would never have approached it if it had been. Even if it was never meant to be a romantic relationship, it wasn't nothing._

Yes. And he had ruined it.

_How? By trying to define the relationship? The EXACT thing the contract had set out to do?_

Howard furrowed his brow. That was different.

_How?_

The contract had only said what to expect from one another, it had not said “the undersigned agreed to stay together all their days until they are doddering and toothless.”

_Yes. It also hadn't said “the undersigned agrees to makes clothes for Howard, brush his hair and spend a few hours each night watching telly with him,” did it?_

Well, no-

_It didn’t say, “the undersigned agrees to cook breakfast together, spend hours being catty about the music scene and go on the occasional adventure,” did it?_

Well, no-

_It didn't say, “we can only ever be fuck friends and never have something deeper,” did it?_

Christ no, would he let himself get a sentence out?

_Of course._

Vince could never love him, Howard reasoned. Because…

_Because..._

He was Howard.

_Ah yes. He was only Howard. And that was why Vince took it upon himself to befriend Howard for over twenty years, even staying with him through the disastrous prog-jazz phaze?_

He _would_ have to bring that up, wouldn't he?

_For good reason! If Howard had been so worthless,  so beneath consideration, why oh why had Vince stuck around?_

God. He had a sound point didn't he?

_Damn skippy._

So what should he do?

_Confront Vince, of course. Make him say it out loud. If it works, hurrah. If it doesn't well...at least it's out in the open._

But what if it ends? What if the best thing in his life ends because he couldn't keep his mouth shut?

_Really, could it be any worse than it was right now?_

Howard pondered.

 

After a wash and a change of clothes, Howard wandered around the flat. It was like the field abandoned after the carnival had packed up and left. Everything that should be there was, except for the thing that had given it life.

Really, what was his life without Vince? Howard tried to imagine living with a Vince-shaped gap in everything he did. He couldn’t.

The door to Vince’s room wasn’t locked. Scant comfort for Howard, who no longer felt welcome anywhere in the flat.

A sliver of light fell on the dressmaker’s  dummy. Howard’s suit still sat on the form.

Howard stroked it with his fingertips. In all this time, Vince hadn’t moved it from the dummy? He was never not busy with some new fashion statement, Howard knew that. He’d gone through several different coats in the weeks since he’d first shown Howard the suit.

And here it was, waiting.

Howard sighed and unbuttoned his shirt.

 

His first time out in public when he didn’t feel everyone was staring at him, Howard actually felt incensed that no one was actually staring at him. He’d made his best go at the hair, still miles behind anything Vince could manage, but the suit. Oh, the suit. It looked even better in the mirror than the first time he’d seen it. He felt like a fancy gigolo, or a very professional coke dealer. Both helped banish the natural awkwardness that came from being out in public. Vince hadn’t just clothed him, he’d given him armor.

The Neon Stingray was one of Vince’s garishly fashionable nightclubs, throbbing with terrible music and the thousand stumbling feet of trendy folk trying to dance.

The bouncer looked oddly familiar. He had on a nehru jacket in psychedelic paisley swirls. An iguana the size of a lapdog perched on his shoulder, wearing an identical lizard-sized jacket.

Howard stared.

The bouncer flicked his gaze at Howard, as if looking up were too much effort. “Name, mate?”

“I'm-I’m not on the list,” Howard said hastily, “I know someone in there.”

The bouncer rolled his eyes. “Password?”

Howard froze.  Vince had never said anything about a password.

“Erm, _I_ _am the son and heir of nothing in particular_?”

The bouncer gave him a good, long stare.

“Look,” Howard said, “I'm actually the coke dealer—”

The bouncer’s demeanor changed in a flash. “Are you, then? Well, get in there. You’re hours overdue.”

Howard drifted past him in a cloud of unbelieving. That had worked?

Dancers swarmed the floor inside. It was impossible to pick out a single body among the mass, much less identify it. Howard stood just inside the door, sweating. God, it was a mistake. A mistake to think—

A black, feathered hat bobbed around a far corner of the club. Howard held his breath. The hat traveled round in rhythmic circles. Once, just once, it lifted up as its owner yelled above the crowd around him. He had his back to Howard, but his hair was black and cheekily backcombed.

Swallowing, Howard descended.

Open, palpable hostility poured from the dancers. It could have been Howard’s obvious air of unbelonging, or the fact that he couldn’t take a step without treading on a foot. But once the initial shame for existing fell away, Howard found out something wonderfully freeing: he didn’t care. He didn’t give a single coconut what any of them thought about him because they weren’t important. Worse, they were between him and Vince.

So Howard started dancing.

Howard had actually been legally restricted from dancing at a venue with an attendance of fifty or over, but the kids in the club didn’t know that. All they knew is that when they saw the whirlwind of elbows and knees coming at them, it was time to step aside. And so Howard carved a swath through the club until he came to the last place he’d seen the hat.

There was a raised bit with tables and dancers resting their feet, drinking alcopops. As the dancers parted in front of Howard in fans, a very familiar hat reappeared before him. Stomach dropping, throat constricting, Howard walked toward it.

There was a bloke with a white fedora and a t-shirt printed with a jacobean puff-sleeved tunic speaking. His eyes went to Howard, then to his intended target, then to Howard. Howard couldn’t hear what he was saying, but then he pointed.

Vince turned and for a moment there was only irked confusion on his face. Then he locked eyes with Howard and all his color drained away.

Howard made himself step up on the platform, forced himself to stride semi-confidently to Vince’s side. Vince looked like he’d seen a ghost.

Howard cleared his throat. The little group that had formed around Vince were younger than they were, babyfaces smeared with makeup and unflattering facial hair. God, had he really been scared of these people, once?

“Hullo.” Howard nodded curtly. “I’m Vince’s coke dealer. I’m here to have a word with him, if you don’t mind.”

Vince still seemed in shock, but he didn’t withdraw when Howard took his arm.

“Hey, you’re a dealer?” one of the group whined after them. “Any way you could sell me a sniff?”

“Tell you what,” Howard called over his shoulder,” see how many of those alcopops you can fit up your nose, and we’ll talk.”

They walked away from the pained spluttering.

“I don’t know where to go,” Howard murmured in Vince’s ear. Vince shuddered, just a little.

“There’s a quiet area,” he said over the music, “where people go to smoke and...anyway, it’s over here.”

They kicked open the door to find a miserable little patio and a sad little hipster trying to vape. One look from Howard and he scarpered back through the door.

Vince’s shoulders relaxed microscopically.

“Well,” Howard said, “here we are.”

Vince sighed. “Yes. here we are.”


	9. Emerald and Beige

_I just can't recall what started it all_  
_Or how to begin in the end_  
_I ain't here to break it  
_ _Just see how far it will bend_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Make it wit chu”

 

Vince stared out into the cityscape. He’d removed the hat, cool night air ruffled his backcomb.

Howard was looking for a place to begin. The earlier bravado that had come from scattering the hipsters was gone, and he was fucking terrified. This wasn’t “we’re strapped to an icicle with a deadly monster coming toward us,” terrified. This was “I'm afraid I'm going to spend the rest of my life without you and even though I'd live I'd never be happy again,” fear.

“I’m sorry,” Howard said. Seemed a logical start as any.

Vince didn’t respond.

“I know that I tend to be...clingy,” Howard went on, “and I know I tend to fall for people who only give me the slightest bit of affection—”

Vince made a noise and buried his forehead in his hands.

Howard paused, afraid to go on.

“But I don’t take it back Vince,” he said, surprising himself, “I meant it then and I mean it now and I know I'll always mean it.”

Vince emerged from the shelter of his hands. “How? How do you know? We’ve never even properly slept together, Howard!”

Howard took a breath. “But you’ve done so much for me. You’ve always done so much for me, Vince.”

Vince laughed humorlessly through his nose. “How? Insulting you? Whipping you? I know you’re hard up for affection, but I didn’t think—”

“Vince.” Howard gave him an odd look. “I _asked_ you to do those things.”

“So?”

“Do you think I could’ve asked anyone else? Anyone at all?”

Vince looked miserable. God, he was ruining it. Ruining it and making Vince hate him.

“That’s the thing, Vince. I _trust_ you. I never thought I'd be able to trust anybody. I never thought I'd meet anyone who understood me as much as you do.”

“I don’t,” Vince said, “I don’t think I understand you at all, Howard.”

“Of course you do.”

“Well I don’t!” Vince burst out. “Okay, sure, it was fun at first, playing around all naughty. But-but then you bring love into it—”

Howard could barely speak through his fear. “Why is love so bad?”

“Because it makes it too real!” Vince shouted.

Howard closed his mouth.

Vince had discarded the hat on a nearby fence post. Now he was running agitated fingers through his hair. His eyeliner was cracking and his feet moved like his shoes pained them. He no longer looked like an invincible sex god. He looked tired and sad. He looked like Howard felt.

“It’s too real,” Vince said, “and I can’t handle real. I’m simple, Howard. I can’t understand how someone can love someone and still hurt them. It was fine when it was all a game, but—” he broke off into a shuddering sigh.

Howard took a step forward. Pure, white-hot terror was sleeting through his veins and if he stopped now he was very sure he’d die.

“That’s just it,” he said gently, “because I love you, you can hurt me. It’s not a bad pain, and it...it helps me even out, you see. Because I can control it, and it comes from you. Vince…” he placed a hand on Vince’s arm. “The world is more or less constantly throwing things at me. It’s very scary being me, sometimes. But if I can control just a tiny piece of that, I can be okay.” he squeezed Vince’s arm. “You said it yourself. I’m really the one in charge, aren’t I?”

Vince said nothing, just stared out into the distance.

“It’s okay if you don’t love me,” Howard said, “I'm used to it.”

Vince winced.

“All I'm asking is that you don’t be mad with me for being such a berk.”

Vince wiped a black braceleted wrist across his eyes. “‘Course I love you, dummy. That ain’t the point.’

Howard fell silent. He was almost completely sure he had just heard that.

“Are we even ready for this? Neither of us are too mature. I mean, you can make some sophisticated arguments about french cinema, but you haven’t even opened up the last three heating bills. And I just ate ice cream for breakfast this morning, so what does that say about me?”

Vince shrugged. The smallest tendril of a smile was curling the corner of his mouth.

This little thing was the miracle that freed Howard’s tongue.

“I don’t think love depends on ‘ready,’” he said softly, “and it doesn’t depend on maturity. It’s not a tax bill. It’s more like...like a cornetto. You know you need one when you need one.”

Vince laughed a little. He was toffee-nosed. “Only you, Howard, could compare love to a tax bill and a dessert. Could you get any sexier?”

Howard smiled.

He leaned forward until his mustache just barely tickled Vince’s ear.

“Order me to fuck you,” he murmured.

Vince’s eyes went wide. “...I beg your pardon?”

“Order me to fuck you.” Fear had made Howard’s voice husky, he hoped to god it worked how he needed it to work.

Vince turned to him, mouth hung slightly open.

“Order me to fuck you,” Howard begged, tucking a strand of hair behind Vince’s ear, “whatever you tell me to do, I'll do.”

Vince dragged a tongue across chapped lips, gaze feverish.

“Howard?”

Howard waited, unable to speak a word more.

“Fuck me.” Vince’s nostrils flared. “Take me home and fuck me. Right this minute. That’s an order.”

Howard’s mouth formed into a smile so slight it was barely there.

Breathlessly, they struggled out of the club. Howard was so afraid Vince would be culled from his side by the writhing mass of dancers that he kept a death grip on Vince’s arm. He only relented when the door slammed behind them and they were out on the street again.

A very familiar man in dramatic black eyeliner was coming the opposite way, accompanied by a tiny, blond figure.

“—and Kirk, you have to promise me no face-eating this time. I know plutonic mega-molly does things to your brain, but you have to—”

The shaman stopped abruptly and made a strangled noise, snatching his hat off Vince’s head and stalking off in the opposite direction. Vince and Howard exchanged a glance.

“...whatever. Okay let’s just—go!”

 

The flat echoed the sound of the front door slamming shut. Howard walked briskly, still gripping Vince’s hand, acting firmly and quickly because he was running on nerve alone and if he hesitated for even a single second he would stop dead.

Vince stopped him in the hall. “Aren’t we going to my room?”

Howard’s mind was a terrified blank. He had never thought this far.

His tongue, acting independently of his brain, said, “are my sheets too beige for you?”

“No, I just…” Vince toed the rug. Was he being shy? “I thought you hated people messing with your bed.”

“Other people, yes.” Howard turned the handle. “But I'll mess it up all I want, thank you.”

Vince, shaking his head, followed Howard in.

Howard was suddenly very aware of how square his bedroom was. The plain mahogany pillows, the taupe rug, the straight-backed chair at his perfectly ordered desk. He paused, hand on his zipper, as self-consciousness threatened to cloud his mind.

He turned and found Vince merrily undressing, kicking off his boots and wrenching off his shirt.

“Come on, we haven’t got all night.”

Howard found his trousers on the floor, shirt and jacket flowing off his body like water. Some last thread of modesty had compelled him to don pants before his costume this evening, now he was struck with another bout of paralysis as he locked eyes with Vince, similarly struggling with his Y-fronts.

Keeping eye contact, Vince slid his pants down his milky thighs. Howard automatically followed suit, as if he was a marionette Vince was controlling by his actions. He stepped out of his underwear, cock filling already, breathing hard. Vince was standing still, just taking Howard in. it was funny, because he’d seen Howard naked so many times, hadn’t he? Then Vince covered his blushing face with his hands, shook his head a little, and lowered his hands to disclose a smile like a magic trick.

Howard had absolutely no idea how to proceed. But now Vince perked up, Vince fished something from his pocket on the floor, Vince threw him a vial of liquid and a packet of johnnies.

“Prepared, aren’t we?” Howard asked, because he couldn’t quite process Vince carrying all this on his person just in case it was time for a fuck.

Vince rolled his eyes. “I don’t carry that around every day. If you were still here when I got back, I was going to…”

They both looked at the floor.

“We’re a couple of prize tools, aren’t we?” Howard admitted.

“Hey, so long as our safeword isn’t ‘nicey nicey zoo zoo’ I think we’re doing alright,” Vince said mock-sternly.

Howard laughed.

Vince’s smiled turned devious and he backed up to the bed, beckoning Howard with a single finger. Howard followed. His body wasn’t under his control anymore. He was Vince’s, Vince’s alone, and he would do anything Vince wanted him to.

Vince pulled him close and began sucking on his index and middle fingers. Okay...hadn’t been expecting that.

Once they were sloppy with saliva, Vince pulled them from his mouth with a little pop. “Okay, you’re going to have to...ease me into it, and I think you know why.”

Howard’s initial disgust was overcome by a wave of desire. Vince thought he was...well, let it never be said that Howard TJ Moon left his lovers wanting.

Howard lowered his fingers until he was circling the threshold of Vince’s arse. Vince, nodding, held onto his knees.

Oh god, he was so tight. And hot. Just the thought of being wrapped in that sort of heat made Howard’s cock harder. He tried simple penetration, just sliding his fingers in and out, then he remembered that he was supposed to be preparing Vince and tried spreading his fingers just a bit.

“Curl your fingers,” Vince ordered.

Howard couldn’t see why, but obeyed. Vince hissed through his teeth and let his head roll backwards on his neck. His body shifted, catlike, on the bed. If Howard had only one image to comfort him for the rest of his life, he would have wanted this: Vince, sprawled out and ready beneath him, smiling like a pornographic cherub.

“That’s enough fun,” Vince said, reopening his eyes. Howard realized how enthusiastic his thrusts had gotten and sheepishly retired his fingers. Vince clicked his tongue.

“Bet you want to wash your hands, don’t you?”

Howard had been thinking that exact thing, yes.

“Well, you don’t get to.” Vince leaned forward. His nipples were flushing red, his pale chest already heaving. “You don’t leave me for one second, do you hear me? I don’t even like you looking away.”

Howard nodded dumbly. His cock was so desperate for attention he felt it might break away and start its own Twitter account, but then Vince took it in hand and spared the world another knobhead on social media.

“Johnny,” he said. Howard surrendered the package, and enjoyed a slow, torturous tease as Vince sheathed him.

“Vial,” he said, hand out. Howard forked over the vial. Vince spread it evenly over his cock, and Howard knew masturbation was now ruined for him too. Nothing had ever felt this good and if it got much better, he suspected, a stray meteor would probably pelt through the roof and kill them both.

Vince was watching him, eyes hot and still, hand moving steadily.

“Do you want this?” he whispered, “do you want this?”

Yelping inarticulately would probably be a poor answer, so Howard nodded so hard his head threatened to fall off his neck.

“Well, you can have it.” Vince suddenly let go and laid back. He was a carnal masterpiece. Dorian Gray by way of Aubrey Beardsley. And he was all Howard’s.

Howard’s body moved automatically. He crawled down the bed to Vince, their faces inches apart. His arms took Vince’s legs and wrapped them around his middle, his strong, callused hands found Vince’s cheeks and pried them apart, then suddenly the head of his cock was at Vince’s entrance and suddenly he was inside and it was everything he’d been promised and more. God, he never wanted it to end. Vince arched his back and gasped, hair sticking to the sweat on his face. Muscles rippled down his sides as Howard inched inside him, oh-so-mindful of the fragileness of the moment. If he hurt Vince, even a little, he would never be able to live with himself.

But Vince reared up, grinning like a tiger, to capture Howard’s mouth. They had kissed before, yes, in moments of desperation. But not like this. Nothing like this. He was fucking Vince’s mouth as he was fucking Vince’s body. And it took every ounce of control not to come right then and there. Howard had to recapture the fear of earlier that evening, holding it in his chest as his cock rejoiced in its new home.

Vince pulled away, gasping, “Howard, move.”

Howard obeyed.

Vince didn’t want to let him go, he slid out only a little at first, then he pushed back in. He pulled out a little more on the next stroke, then pushed in deeper. Vince groaned and thrashed. Howard did it again. And again. And suddenly, he was fucking.

The word had carried such a different connotation before this. Fucking was amazing. He could no longer see how anyone could use it in the negative. “Fucking terrible” was an oxymoron now, as far as Howard was concerned.

He remembered Vince’s request with his fingers and tried to aim up a little. That earned him a growl as Vince dug clawed fingers into his shoulders. They both shifted, moving as one unit as they fucked, god it was good, they fucked, Howard loved Vince, they fucked, Vince loved Howard, they fucked, everything was beautiful.

“Vince,” Howard gasped, “Vince. What color?”

Vince blinked confusedly, something Howard relished. “Wha…?” it took a moment.

“Green,” he said, “fucking green.”

“What green,” Howard said, smiling fiendishly, “a yellow-green?”

“Deep green. Ohhh, dark green. Evergreen.” Vince was whimpering.

Howard shifted a little.

“Fuck—leaf green. Seafoam. Malachite. Moss.”

Howard wrapped one arm around Vince’s back, and the other hand around Vince’s cock.

“Jesus! Jade, peridot, amazonite, emerald!” Vince yelped.

Howard plowed him into the pillows.

“Emerald!” Vince cried in time with his thrusts, “emerald! Emerald! Emerald!”

His cries devolved into ragged shouts until he painted Howard’s chest with come. Then and only then, did Howard allow himself to climax.

Howard held himself above Vince’s prone form, arms straight, back straight, cock softening. Vince lay beneath him, eyes shut, hair perfectly mussed, whimpering. Both were sucking air in like they’d just run a race.

Vince’s eyes opened and he took in Howard, gaze wandering from his nose, to his eyebrows, to his mouth, finally his eyes.

“Come here, you berk,” he murmured. Howard gladly fell into his arms. It didn’t matter which of them fell asleep first, or that he had left the door open in his haste, or that neither of them bothered to cover up much. What mattered was currently hogging the pillow and snoring in a way that would have been unflattering in any other person.

Howard slept.


	10. Everybody's gonna be happy

_I love you more_   
_Than I can control_   
_I don't even try_ _  
Why would I?_

—Queens of the Stone Age, “Kalopsia”

Howard woke drained and sticky and it took a moment before he figured out why. That moment was the moment he tried to move his bare arm and found it still pinned by the weight of Vince’s head.

Howard gazed into Vince’s early-morning disarray, last night’s eyeliner, the snarled and snagged fringe, the glistening trail of drool from the corner of Vince's mouth, and realized he had never been so happy to wake up. He spent a few minutes like that, just looking at Vince, reliving every scene from last night in his head. His cock fluttered to attention.

Something fell in the kitchen.

Howard sat bolt upright. Fuck. was it the cat? No, they didn’t have a cat.  His heart hammered as Howard jumped from bed, trying to root out his shorts. Vince woke as he was trying to don them, clumsily fighting with one foot as he stumbled into other things. Vince’s face was blissful confusion for a moment, then reality hit him too. His urgent gaze flicked to the door. Howard nodded, yes, probably.

The room became a frantic dance of attempted dressing. Howard tried putting his foot through Vince’s sleeve. Vince’s trousers were somehow inside-out and knotted. Shoes were a nightmare. Finally, when they had got themselves halfway presentable, they strolled out the door as if nothing was amiss.

Bollo was manning the stove. Naboo was clean-shaven for a change, and looked neater than he had in a while as he popped two slices of pumpernickel into the toaster.

“Alright, Naboo,” Vince said as he took a seat, not looking at Howard at all.

“Alright?” Naboo shook his head. “The council called an emergency meeting last night. Apparently _someone_ found his hat. Just like that, I'm un-suspended. Bull. Shit.”

“Well, you can at least be thankful it’s all over?” Howard ventured cautiously. “Even if it’s only at the whim of a bunch of drugged-out hypocrites, you’ve still got your own back.”

Naboo shrugged dismissively. “Until the next time. Anyway, what’s the deal with you two? You’re wearing each other’s belts.”

Vince and Howard looked down.

“Fuck.”

“I knew I felt a bit loose this morning!”

“And just what is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing…” Vince looked away to hide his laughter. “You’re a bit stouter than me, that’s all.”

“How dare you. I jazzercise thrice weekly, meanwhile you live on a diet that would choke a Keebler elf.”

“Oh hello, Mr. Butter-on-everything, were we talking hypocrisy?”

“I like _flavor_ in my food, thank you, and another thing—”

“So you’re sleeping together,” Naboo cut in, “when did that happen?”

Howard and Vince fell into awkward silence.

“While you were having an affair with john barleycorn, sir,” Howard said with icy dignity. Vince snickered. Howard kicked him under the table. “We were so distressed with the unstable nature of the future, what else were we to do?”

Naboo squinted. “I don’t remember any of this.”

“That’s right, because you were hammered!” Vince cut in. “we could’ve raised the Titanic in the next room, you would’ve been oblivious. You see what happens when you go on a bender?”

“So if I stop drinking, you’ll stop sleeping together?” Naboo asked confusedly.

“Too late for that, sorry,” Howard said crisply.

Naboo looked from Vince to Howard. He shrugged.

“Whatever. Just close your door next time, okay? I don’t need to see that.”

“No need to tell us that,” Howard said, warmth flushing back into his body. He didn’t even know what he’d been afraid of.

“We had a late night,” Vince said blandly, as if BDSM-laced sex was an activity on par with watching television, “so we’ve got a lot to work on this morning. Band things.”

“By band things, do you mean band things or _band things_?”

Vince raised his eyebrows.

“Right,” Naboo said disgustedly, throwing up his hands, “I'm off to Xooberon. You two ballbags exercise caution, alright? I don’t want to come back and find Howard pregnant, or something.”

“Why am I the go to subject for that statement?” Howard snapped. Vince barely managed to hide his laughter when Howard shot him a glare.

Once they were alone in the flat, they spread out on the sofa and turned on the telly. It was a scene so abnormally normal Howard had a weird out-of-body moment.

“Is this how it’s going to be?” he asked no one in particular.

Vince looked at him. “Don’t tell me you’re bored already.”

“I’m not,” Howard said hastily, “I just—we had sex last night, didn’t we? That wasn’t a salacious fever-dream?”

“Might’ve been,” Vince said cheekily. Howard hit him with a pillow.

“So we just continue on like we have been? Nothing’s really changed?”

‘Yeah, mate.” Vince flipped through channels. “We’ve always been friends. Now we’re friends who have sex with each other.”

“So...boyfriends?” Howard ventured.

“Sure, if you like.” Vince swept the hair from his face. “Boyfriends, fuck partners, sexsplorers, you name it.”

“Just boyfriends is fine by me.”

“Square.” Vince smirked.

Howard held the pillow and squeezed it a bit. “What should we do, then? We’ve got the whole day.”

“Funny you should ask that.” Vince pulled the contract from somewhere on his person. “I was thinking we should go over this again, maybe shuffle some things from the ‘negotiable’ column?”

“What did you have in mind?”

Vince looked innocently off to the side, fingertip conspicuously resting on “anal play.”

Howard reddened. “Right. That’s fair. I also thought we could work out some safe words, you know, for us? Who says we have to use standard words?”

“What, like other colors? Emerald worked for me.”

“But I'm more of a neutrals man, Vince. Couldn’t we work that in, somehow?”

“What?” Vince chuckled incredulously. “The stoplight colors work because there’s plenty of ways to say green. How many shades of beige could there be?”

Howard glared. “Plenty. We could use other words, too. Words that we’d never normally say otherwise.”

“Like ‘figging?’”

Vince dissolved into giggles as Howard hit him with the pillow again.

“Right,” he said, “I actually looked that up, and we are never inserting something spicy into—”

“Howard. I was kidding.”

“If you can’t take this seriously,” Howard said sternly, holding Vince’s wrists as he kissed him, “I'm afraid this meeting is over.”

“Look at you, topping from the bottom.” Howard’s kisses couldn’t quite wipe away Vince’s grin. “Told you going out in public with me would do you a world of good.”

“Yes, pants-shitting terror is quite a character builder, I'll admit.” Howard drew Vince’s face away to pet the hairs from his forehead. “But if you hadn’t said ‘yes’ then, it would’ve destroyed me.”

“Like I could ever tell you no.” Vince captured his bottom lip. Howard’s tongue traveled along familiar passages, letting Vince paw at the fastenings of his clothing.

“Be honest,” he breathed in a break from kissing. “You were lying when you said you had experience in this area.”

“Oh damn, I thought I hid it well.” Vince was giggling again. “Your browser history was very helpful, though.”

“Fuck’s sake—”

“Don’t worry, Naboo still thinks computers are just a fad, and Bollo’s fingers aren’t fit for anything smaller than a hammer.”

“Well _that’s_ a relief. I was afraid something embarrassing would happen, like someone else would accidentally see us naked.”

Vince drew away. He was abnormally still, like he was in a trance.

“Howard,” he murmured. “Howard. I have an idea.”

 

“It’s cold as an arctic coconut up here, Vince.”

“I know. Bet your nipples could cut glass.”

Howard flushed crimson, despite the night air. Yes, his nipples did indeed feel stiff enough to cut glass, and it was not entirely the temperature’s fault.

“Suppose someone sees me.”

“I’ve got your coat, don’t worry.” Vince waved at Howard’s duffle coat, which he currently sat upon. “Anyway, that’s the fun, innit?”

Though Howard could not repeat it aloud, he agreed. His stomach churned as his his feet gripped the roof tiles. He sat only a little ways away from the spot where they had first kissed. The chimney blocked them from the sight of their nearest neighbors. But nothing blocked them from the other buildings. Anyone could look out at any second, see him stark naked and hard as a ship’s mast—

Howard gave a shuddering sigh as anxiety and excitement meshed in his chest.

“After this, can we try my idea?” he asked.

“Fine, but you’ve still got ten minutes up here.”

Ten minutes. He could do that. After all, who was out and about at a time like—

“ _When you are d’moon, sometimes you see strange things. Like a naked man on a roof sitting next to a perfectly good witch_.”

“Vince? _Vince_? It sees us! Ecru! Ecru!”

“Calm your tits! I’ve got your coat right here.”

“ _Sometimes the witch is very helpful. Aww, a nice witch_.”

“Ecru! Buff! Taupe!”

“Stop screaming, I forgot which one that means!”

“ _Sometimes the screaming man and his witch go inside. Now the moon is all alone. I’m the moon_.”

Howard and Vince slammed the door, gasping.

“My idea?” Howard asked.

Vince gulped and nodded.

“But remember, your feet aren’t supposed to go that high.” he said as they wandered down the hall.

“Will you stop nagging me, I've done this before.”

“Right, and if I hadn’t come home and freed you, you’ve have died from embarrassment.”

“Cheeky bitch.”

“Just for that, you get an extra five stripes.”

“Ohhh, aren’t we officious?”

“Ten.”

Howard smiled broadly as they shut the bedroom door behind them.

 

_Ev’rybody’s gonna be happy  
_ _Which means you and me, my love._

—Queens of the Stone age, “Ev'rybody’s gonna be happy”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a big, booshy thank-you to everyone who read. <3

**Author's Note:**

> I know what you're thinking and no, this will not just be a shameless retread of FSoG.  
> ...mostly because I know how BDSM works(bam! take _that_ , multimillion-dollar franchise!)  
> I kid, I kid.


End file.
